Documents with The Goan blow the cover off the veneer of legality of Anjuna’s most controversial shacks and bars. But what lies beneath is a seedier truth that the police, panchayat and even the government has done nothing to stop them inspite of their own letters admitting the these places are illegal
It is five pm on the beachfront on a Monday evening. Not aholiday for rest of Goa, Anjuna thumps to the tune of Ghosts and SmoothCriminals by Deadmau5 vs Michael Jackson, a 2009 club mash up. Sheer musicpower over 150 decibels, much over the prescribed limit for human consumption.Soon another track joins in from another shack, restaurant and another.Curlie’s, Hippies, Shiva Valley, U V Bar, each sound system trying to drown outthe other. Even the sea has retracted back to reveal a floor of rocks andcrags. The daily ‘rave’ of Anjuna has just begun.
As part of its constant focus on illegalities in the Anjunaand adjoining coastal belt, The Goan has stumbled upon a shocking despicabletruth. Anjuna is a village under siege from the very people who protect it. TheState Government has turned accomplice to an unholy alliance of police,panchayat and the four illegal dens of drugs, crime and prostitution. Thepanchayat and the police actually protect illegal establishments like Curlie’sand UV Bar, knowing that they are indeed illegal. Moreover, as documentssourced by The Goan indicate, the Anjuna police and the panchayat have beenwriting letters, each asking the other to shut down the illegal places, whenboth authorities have powers under various acts to do so.
On November 29, 2012, Anjuna’s Police Inspector VishweshKarpe wrote to Panchayat of Anjuna-Caisua asking for the cancellation oflicences / NOCs issued to Curlie’s Shack and Restaurant, Shiva Valley Bar andrestaurant, U V Bar and Restaurant and Hippies Ocean Café ‘on a prioritybasis’.
Sitting smug on the other side is the Anjuna VillagePanchayat. The distance between the Police Station and Panchayat may be just1.5 kilometres but the reply to Anjuna PI Karpe went a month later onDecember 24. “No licences have been issued to the mentioned restaurant owners”wrote Sarpanch Pratima Govekar, “as the same have been held up due to variouscomplaints received from residents against them for noise pollution, trafficcongestion and other illegalities”. Govekar signed off by saying PI should“initiate prompt action and stop any activity in these premises as it violatesthe law of the land”. She wrote this a day before Christmas, at a timewhen Goa was partying for a full week beginning Christmas eve and ending in theNew Year. The panchayat kept its public records clear by replying to the letter‘in public interest’ but what about action?
Sixty six days later, the party hasn’t stopped. As Team Goan witnessed on numerous occasions,the music plays on, the drinks keep pouring, and the chillums are filled andsmoked. Heady? Yes. A tourists“paradise”? Yes. Legal: NO
Karpe’s defence for not acting: “there is no particularsection in the Law under which police could start taking action against thesepremises. Panchayat should seal the premises as police doesn’t have thepower.” If he felt the law was hisfriend he could have approached his senior SDPO Mapusa or even had powers toapproach Deputy Collector, Bardez to seek permission to seal the premises. Hedidn’t.
The Anjuna panchayats defense for not acting: “We don’t havethe machinery to demolish or remove them, being a small Panchayat”, say SavioAlmeida, Deputy Sarpanch, Anjuna-Caisua. Almeida has no answer as to how thePanchayat failed to approach the Courts to seek closure of these businesses.
And now the government too: if the Panchayat andPolice are playing with public intelligence, Goa Government just raised thebar. Earlier last week (on January 24, 2012), in reply to a petition filed byAnjuna residents Desmond Alvares and others in a matter related to playing ofloud music, Additional Government Advocate Pankaj Vernekat told Hon’bleJustices V M Kanade and U V Bakre of High Court of Bombay at Goa that “inrespect of two establishments said parties are held inside the premises” andthat “in the past Police have been taking action whenever there is a violationof the said condition”.
The left arm doesn’t know what the right arm does: In caseyou missed this, the government has declared in court that parties are held“inside the premises”. Since four establishments are seen jointly under thesame scanner, it’s not a question of whether the parties are held inside ornot, but of whether the venues are legal. And as the correspondence between theAnjuna Police station and Panchayat reveal, they are clearly not. Doesn’t thegovernment in Panjim know what goes on in Anjuna? Or does it simply prefer not to know?
